The InterOperability Lab at UNH has a national, even international, reputation as a good place for testing and certification of network devices and helping the development of standards. So I’m happy to see that they’ve begun a program focusing on security...

Tonight (Dec. 8) will see the earliest sunset of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, even though the shortest day of the year won’t happen for almost two weeks. Equally confusing, the latest sunrise of the year won’t happen until almost two weeks after...

You can’t say I avoid the tough issues: My Monitor column today ponders whether to put your windshield wipers up when you park and a storm coming, or leave them down. You can read it here and then tell me why I’m an...

From the Associated Press: “Scientists are recognizing that a waterborne disease sickening tens of thousands of people each year is associated with warmer waters of the Gulf of Mexico moving northward, partly due to climate change. The problem is extremely rare...

Despite all the recent rain, Concord and many other New Hampshire communities are still asking people to conserve water, and two-thirds of the state is still listed as suffering from “severe drought,” although that’s a bit of an improvement from the “extreme drought”...

The November Science Cafe Concord discussed 3-D printing and had the subtitle “Has it lived up to its promise?” The panelists, from printer-manufacturer SolidScape in Merrimack, Technology Education Concepts in Concord and Manchester Makerspace, made a...

UPDATE: Online petitions may be pointless, but competing ones have been created at Change.org over this issue – this one supports the hotel; and this one opposes it. The owner of the Cog Railway has an idea: Build a 35-room hotel alongside – maybe even...

Because of the way cannabis grows (lots and lots of heat is needed), it is generally cultivated indoors and requires tons of electricity. As much as half of one percent of all electricity in Colorado current goes to indoor cannabis farming! The Energy Gang, an...

Science Cafe New Hampshire takes December off, but SEE Science Center in Manchester still holds its science-chat-in-a-bar session, called Science on Tap. Its held at the Stark Brewing Company, 50 Commercial St. in Manchester, on Tuesday, Dec. 6 at 6 p.m., and the...

Local media is finally getting back to other stories in the post-election days, and one of those is our drought – which is continuing, despite a relatively rainy month. The Uniobn-Leader and NHPR have had “we’re still in a drought” stories and...

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About Granite Geek

Dave Brooks has written a science/tech column since 1991 - yes, that long - and has written this blog since 2006, keeping an eye on topics of geekish interest in and around New Hampshire, from software to sea level rise, population dynamics to printing (3-D, of course). He moderates monthly Science Cafe NH discussions, beer in hand, and discusses the geek world regularly on New Hampshire Public Radio.

Brooks earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics but got lost on the way to the Ivory Tower and ended up in a newsroom. He has reported for newspapers from Tennessee to New England. Rummage through his bag of awards you'll find oddities like three Best Blog prizes from the New Hampshire Press Association and a Writer of the Year award from the N.H. Farm and Forest Bureau, of all places. He joined the Concord Monitor in 2015.